•   CONTENTS                                                         Before Paphos
                          Magic Carpets
           Art Gallery                                               by Loretta Casteen
       o
                          By Leslie What
           Articles                                                  8 January 2007
       o
                          26 July 2004
           Columns                                                   It starts again. The baby
       o
                                                                     begins to cough and choke.
                          Reprinted by permission; originally
           Fiction
       o
                          published in Realms of Fantasy,
                                                                     Locked Doors
                          September/October 1995
           Poetry
       o
                                                                        by Stephanie Burgis
                          The Santa Ana winds arrived, whipped into
           Reviews
       o
                          frenzy by a spirit with the power to fold hot 1 January 2007
           Archives       air inside wind. I lay beside my big sister
       o
                                                                        You can never let anyone
                          Pammy in the backyard, feeling the dry
•   ABOUT US              breeze tickle the backs of my legs. My skin suspect, his mother told him.
                          itched where the crop top had exposed a That was the first rule she
           Staff
       o
                          four-inch band of belly to dead grass. I sat taught him, and the last,
                          up to scratch and Pammy sat up, too. She before she left him here alone
           Guidelines
       o
                                                                        with It.
                          tugged her shirt down, as if to cover the
           Contact        welts Daddy had raised that morning, then
       o
                                                                        Heroic Measures
                          reached to pull the sports page from
           Awards
       o                  beneath her transistor radio.
                                                                        by Matthew Johnson
           Banners
       o                  "What time is the game?" I asked. We
                                                                     18 December 2006
                          hadn't had a radio or a team back home,
•   SUPPORT US
                          but in Los Angeles we had both.           Pale as he was, it was hard to
      o Donate                                                      believe he would never rise
                    Pammy checked her watch. "Now," she from this bed. Even in the
                    said.
      o Bookstore                                                   darkest times, she had never
                                                                    really feared for him; he had
      o Merchandise A wind blew, thick and breathy like a child
                                                                    always been strong, so strong.
                    learning to whistle. I watched a leaf fall
•   COMMUNITY       from one of our two avocado trees and           Love Among the Talus
                    circle in the air, stirred by the wind's hand.
      o Forum
                    Pammy let go of the paper and it skimmed by Elizabeth Bear
                    twenty feet along the grass before landing
      o Readers'
                    on the chain-link cyclone fence that divided 11 December 2006
        Choice
                    the back of our property from the
                                                                    Nilufer raised her eyes to his.
                    neighbor's.
                                                                    It was not what women did to
                    "I better get it," Pammy said, "before it flies men, but she was a princess,
                                                                    and he was only a bandit. "I
                    into Mrs. Garcia's yard." Daddy had
                    warned us just that morning to stay away want to be a Witch," she said.
                    from Mrs. Garcia, ". . .that witch next door. "A Witch and not a Queen. I
                    Stay away from her and her devil magic," wish to be not loved, but
                                                                    wise. Tell your bandit lord, if
                    he'd said, but if it hadn't been magic, he
                    would have found another reason to keep he can give me that, I might
                                                                    accept his gift."
                    us to our yard.
                                                                       Archived Fiction Dating back
                          Pammy found his superstitions funny. I
                          couldn't help looking past the fence to Mrs. to 9/1/00
                          Garcia's back door, wondering why she
                          had been nice to us all summer, awfully nice
                          for someone who wasn't even a blood
                          relative. I didn't want to trust her. Maybe
                          Daddy was right. Maybe Mrs. Garcia was